Chris Duel tackles all sides of news and sports from a fiercely independent perspective. A local radio fixture since 1997, his show on WOAI became the city's highest-rated radio talk show and set modern day ratings records for News-Talk format in San Antonio.

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Miracle in Miami?

These three words I thought of, spoke of, wrote of and tweeted of before these NBA Finals began on June 6th.

The words came to me in the form of a premonition, but I also embraced them with my logical mind.

My rationale was that neither team was going to win in five games or less. To think that one of these teams would win four of five games against such seasoned competition was highly unlikely. Thus, neither the Heat nor the Spurs would be celebrating on the AT&TCenter floor before the series returned to Miami for its conclusion.

If the Spurs were to dethrone the defending NBA Champions, they would have to do it in a hostile environment.

Letting go of left brain logic, I opened my mind and right brain to the intuition of what I felt would happen in this series. The three words would not go away, Miracle in Miami.

But I also felt it would happen in Game 6. Of all scenarios involving the Spurs winning the title on the Heat’s home floor, only one made the most sense to me. The prospect of the Spurs having to win Games 6 and 7 seemed impossible (luckily they did not have to). Winning Game 7 seemed next-to-impossible (a road team has not won Game 7 of The Finals since 1978). But winning Game 6 with a Miracle in Miami appeared to be the most possible of the options.

Perhaps my premonition did not foresee Manu or Kawhi’s missed free throws or the Spurs inability to get a title-clinching rebound in the final minute of regulation play.

Perhaps my intuition of a Miracle in Miami was the likely outcome of the Spurs leading by five in the final seconds, but some cosmic force beyond my comprehension altered that fate forever.

Or maybe the Miracle in Miami happens in Game 7.

While the heartbreaking, soulwrenching way the Spurs lost in Game 6 has nearly dashed all hope among the faithful, a Miracle in Miami would be more of a miracle if there were no other game to fall back on. This seventh game is ultimate finality for either the Spurs or the Heat tonight.

Salesian sisters of St. John Bosco, photo by Bob Owen, San Antonio Express-News

On the front page of the Express-News this morning, the city awoke to a story and images of the Salesian sisters of St. John Bosco praying in church alongside Spurs flags and a Coyote doll. In the Sports section, a full page poster with the headline “Let Us Pray” features the sisters as well. Images of a praying Spurs Jesus are being posted all over Facebook while curanderas and curanderos light Manu candles invoking divine mojo for the divine Argentine.

Globally recognized astrologer and author of the book Pronoia, Rob Brezsny even pondered what mystical forces might be channeled on the Spurs behalf tonight.

“Would it be gray magic to cast a spell to boost the Spurs,” Brezsny asked on my Facebook page.

The three words now are punctuated with a question mark until tonight’s Game 7 ends.

Miracle in Miami?

The Spurs will need one.

Spurs Jesus Prays for a Miracle in Miami, photo by Dayna De Hoyos

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Chris Duel is the host of the Spurs Net Center during Spurs broadcasts on 1200 WOAI Radio and is the co-founder and co-host of Talk Now SA, a live video talk show covering all things San Antonio.